man4 jin4文言

Jyutpingman4 jin4

Yalemàhn yìhn

名詞Rare

Definition

Classical Chinese; the written language based on ancient Chinese.

neutralschool

How it's used

Refers specifically to the written style of classical Chinese rather than a spoken dialect. It is frequently contrasted with 白話文, which represents modern written Chinese based on vernacular speech. In academic or formal contexts, it is often discussed in terms of its grammatical structure and brevity compared to modern language.

Examples

le1呢pin1篇man4文jin4言hou2好sam1深，ngo5我tai2睇m4唔ming4明aa4呀。

This classical Chinese text is very deep, I cannot understand it.

nei5你ping4平si4時jau5有mou5冇duk6讀hoi1開man4文jin4言㗎？

Do you usually read classical Chinese?

Common phrases

man4文jin4言man2文

classical Chinese text

Common mistake

Learners often confuse this with the spoken language of the past, but it is strictly a literary medium that was never meant to be read aloud exactly as written in daily life.